French President Emmanuel Macron has taken advantage of the European Union’s relatively liberal provisions for the protection of predators and announced that a new law may be needed to allow more wild wolves to be hunted, Politico reports.
During a visit to Aveyron on the 3rd of July, the French president said: “We’re not going to let the wolf develop and go into [areas] where it competes with our activities. And so that means that we must, as we say modestly, cull more of them.” Macron was referring to wolf attacks on livestock.
The president said that people who pass laws but do not live with their animals in areas where bears and wolves are present should go and spend two nights there.
The number of reports of wolf attacks on livestock has increased over the past decade and a half, with more than ten thousand livestock being mauled each year.
European lawmakers in May gave the green light to a bill that changes the European Habitats Directive, moving wolves from the list of “strictly protected” to “protected” animals. This means that hunting rules are being relaxed.
The changes to the directive will enter into force on July 14, and member states will have to make corresponding changes to their national laws by January 2027. The change to the directive was heavily pushed by the conservative European People’s Party to curry favor with farmers ahead of the European Parliament elections. It became a “personal project” for European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen after wolves mauled her pony.
Conservation groups say the decision to relax the rules is wrong and that Macron is engaging in populism by spreading completely false information.
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Macron: Lawmakers should spend two nights with the wolves
